Please respect the fact that this is a humble attempt from my side to record some recipes, handed over to my family through grandmas & great-grandmas and also share some favourite dishes of my family, including the one I married into. All the content in this blog (text and photographs) are mine, unless noted otherwise. Copying, re-writing, republishing, redistributing or altering any text or photograph or part of the text, for any commercial or non-commercial purposes, without my written consent is strictly prohibited. Users with non-commercial purposes may link to the page or a specific post, but not allowed to reproduce or alter the content( text and photographs) without prior written permission. Please ASK first at shncjj@gmail.com. Kindly use comments section for any recipe clarifications and e-mails will not be entertained in this regard.

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Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Almost a fortnight ago, on one of my routine calls to home, my mother filled me in on the gathering they had at her brother’s place earlier that day. They were meeting my uncle’s family after several years and my mother was quite delighted to see her nephews and niece after such a long gap. With bursts of excitement, she went on talking about them and how all three of them have blossomed into well seasoned teenagers. Food being the pulse and heart of any such family gatherings, they had prepared a grand feast, to celebrate the family reunion. My mother enumerated an array of dishes that gave serious cravings to my already starved stomach . One of the items in menu was a pork curry and quoting my aunt’s words, my mother happily told me that they bought and prepared that dish knowing well that she loves it! I was touched. I was moved by the fact that they remembered such a tiny detail about my mother’s food preferences, even after such a long span of time. The more and more I thought about my aunt’s remark, I felt it was a beautiful testament to my mother’s porky love!

Yes, she just loves that fatty meaty 'artery clogging' goodness. Growing up, Sunday was the day dedicated for cooking chicken at home but there was some exceptions too. Very rarely, pork would be presented at the table, on days when my mother’s cravings became loud and clear. As a picky fussy teenager, I could never embrace myself to eat the special of the day as the curry always contained lots of fatty chunks and since that was the only wet curry on the table to smear my rice with, I had no option but to ladle some gravy and dig out some pieces without thick slabs of fat. But Mummy would be sitting just across the table devouring each and every slab of fat, “nei-kashanam” in her words, she could lay her hands on and I found it gross those days…I never understood the whole funda behind her fervor but now I have the gastronomic wisdom to know that she has been true pork aficionado.

During her stay here, she feasted her eyes on the beautifully arranged, hunger stimulating display of various cuts of pork meat, sliced and unsliced slabs of bacon, huge loaves of ham, smoked pork shanks and shoulders , sausage links and so on at the supermarkets. Her visits to the Farmers Market and Oktoberfest were never complete with a charred or grilled brat sandwich. I clearly remember that sheepish yet content smile on her face while enjoying slices of ham and sausage links for breakfast at a local breakfast joint here. As I write this , another incident that pops up in my mind is that of my mother forking chunks and chunks of ham into her plate, while prepping her plate ready for cooking, at the Mongolian Barbeque restaurant. Oh, there comes another one, she enjoying ham from the Thanks Giving platter my hospital canteen served. Oh, how can I forget her love for pizza or should I say love for pizza with a double topping of Italian sausage, bacon and pepperoni, considering the fact she despised the chicken tikka pizza we got her from a shopping mall food court near my home in Kerala!!!!

Well, not only does she enjoys pork meat but also good at concocting pork curries and fries or I should say, she knows the right techniques to cook up a pork curry or fry. For instance, the taste maker and flavour enhancer in today’s featured recipe is the pork fat that accumulates on top after pressure cooking. She uses this pork fat to saute onions, instead of regular cooking oil, which explodes the flavours and adds one more tasty layer along with the medley of spices used. Mummy made this pork fry during the last week of their stay here and here’s how she made it.

Ingredients:

To Dry Roast & Marinate:

Around ¾ kg fatty pork, cubed and washed well

1/3 cup Coriander powder

3 tsp Chilly powder ( As per tolerance)

½ tsp turmeric

1 small pod of garlic ( or around 8 big ones) , crushed (Adjust as per your liking for garlic)

Heat a small pan over low heat and dry roast coriander powder till brown and remove. Lower heat again and in the same pan, dry roast chilly powder and when the colour darkens a bit, add turmeric powder and stir for a while and remove. Keep stirring while dry roasting ground spices without burning them.

Marinate cubed meat with roasted spices, crushed ginger, garlic and salt for about 30 minutes; Add around ¾ cup water and pressure cook until done.

Heat a wide pan or mann-chatti/earthenware; pour some of the fat and juice extracted on top after pressure cooking; sauté thinly sliced onions until transparent; you may add some cooking oil if onion is getting dried up and sticking to the pan. At this stage , throw in green chillies and continue to cook until onions are golden brown. Now sprinkle black pepper powder and stir for few seconds and then add 1 tsp Masala powder/Garam Masala and sauté for a minute or two or until a nice aroma comes; now tear off the curry leaves , crush them in your palms and add to masala. Transfer cooked meat from the pressure cooker and add to the masala and let it cook over medium heat for a while, until everything comes together and flavours blend well; towards the middle of cooking add 1 more teaspoon Masala powder/Garam Masala. Let the it simmer, roast slowly dry up in low heat (this process may take about 20-30 minutes depending on the amount of gravy that needs to be dried up) and towards the end of cooking, add 1 more tsp Masala powder/Garam Masala and some more crushed curry leaves, stir well and turn off the stove after 5-6 minutes.

Serve with rice or any flat breads of your choice,

Notes: Though optional, adding some potato sticks/cubes fried in oil, towards the end of the cooking , i.e., when meat is almost roasted and gelled well all spices and herbs, add one more layer to the taste. Please make sure that , these fried potato sticks/cubes are in the pan, along with the meat, for about 10-20 minutes, to marry the flavours of meat, spices and herbs.

“But Mummy would be sitting just across the table devouring each and every slab of fat, nei-kashanam in her words....” when I read this I could imagine what is happening there… because my mother is also an excellent nei-kashanam eater!! She couldn’t resist eating it unless my father or me forcefully stop her. She even save excess pork fat to fry cassava or just to add to cassava ularthiyathu!!

Home chef, wow...she is a pork lover for sure! that's such a wonderful idea to use pork fat to fry cassava...never heard of it...flavour burst for sure :)

Nitha, aa...athu thanneya combination :)

Simi, thanks a lot for checking on me :) and thx a bunch for the onam wishes too...making sadya for onam? have a wonderful onam to u and ur family :)

Sijo, looks like u re a pork fan :D

Kel, u can try this with beef too by mummy;s beef fry prep is slightly different...u can check my recipe index for a beef varattiyathu recipe and there's a beef curry recipe in kappa biryani post. hope u try and turn out just the way u wanted :)

During my childhood one of my schoolfrnds told me tht eating port leads to tapeworms inside the tummy....tht just stuck on forever and till today I hv never gone back to pork :(This blogpost hs gvn me enuf courage for a culinary expedition...shuld try my hand at this recipe..

I have had great success cooking this dish right from the very first time I tried it out. The addition of potato cubes to the dish was a pleasant change. Thank you for posting such an easy yet delicious recipe!

Thank you for posting this wonderful, authentic recipe. I tweaked the recipe a little bit (like I used only kashmiri chilli powder so as to make it less hot and only lean pork to limit the damage to the arteries) but the end result was still wonderful!

To all those who might get put off by the lengthy narrative, it is quite easy to make. Please don't miss this opportunity to make something so mouth-wateringly delicious!!